Hey everyone,
Just thought I'd like to share my GMAT experience, as well as shill for a bit about the prep program I used. I say shill because I am clearly quite positive about the program, but I'd like to state that I'm not getting anything outta being so positive! I'm honestly just very impressed that it helped me score so well, as I wasn't expecting any more than about 740 as a hard upper limit. If any of this helps any of you guys out, it'd be fantastic.
Little bit about me:
Final year university student, American but studying overseas. Terribly rusty math AND English skills after so many years out of high school; as an Accounting/Finance major, you don't really practise the things which get tested on the GMAT. Hell, I'd even forgotten things like basic geometry, or how best to tackle Venn diagrams. So... I decided that I needed a little help.
Preparation:
After examining a few different GMAT prep program options, I eventually settled on GMAT Pill. Kaplan appears to be slightly poorer reviewed, and Manhattan's more expensive, so GMAT Pill it was.
Everything was pretty nicely laid out, and explained in a manner that was easy to grasp, and the always-available online video format made it easy to study whenever and wherever I wanted to, provided I had my phone or tablet with me. At home, on the subway, or even sitting by the pool. Don't underestimate the importance of a convenient studying resource that doesn't weigh several pounds; it'll make it much easier to keep studying consistently and allow you to take quick "study breaks" in between bouts of whatever it is you usually do.
I first started on the material about three to four weeks before my GMAT, and studied fairly
inconsistently over the next few weeks. On the whole, I believe I put in about 10-20 hours of time fully concentrating on the material, and possibly another 10-20 or so leaving the videos running while I did other things that weren't overly taxing on my mental resources - television, video games, laundry, and such. It might not seem like a whole lot of time, but that's part of my point entirely; the program ran through things in such a simple way that it wasn't difficult to understand the concepts. So again... pretty impressed.
Exam experience:
Not sure yet how well I did on the AWA segment, but nobody really cares about that one, right? At any rate, it went passably. Was a little bit pressed for time because my mind wandered off for a bit during the Analysis Of An Issue section, but managed to finish my essay with less than a minute left on the clock.
When I got to the Quant segment, I immediately found that most of the questions seemed very familiar to me. Pretty much everything that the GMAT was testing had been gone through on the GMAT Pill videos; there were a couple of odd-looking questions (and I mean really odd), but I assumed that those were "experimental" questions and so didn't stress myself out too much about 'em. Finished up with about 25 minutes left on the clock.
Verbal segment seemed even more straightforward. Nothing strange-looking, and all of the questions were in a familiar format. Finished that segment with 40 (!) minutes left on the clock.
It might be of note that I made sure to take the breaks in between the segments, even though I didn't really feel like I needed them. During each break, I just sat on the chairs in the test centre, closed my eyes for a bit, and rested my brain. It might have helped or it might not, but I feel that a lot of people could benefit from taking these breaks; they give you time to, at the very least, "shift gears" from writing to quant and then from quant to verbal.
If I could go back and change anything that I did, it would be to tell myself to slow down a little. Time yourself well, and make sure that you're spending an appropriate amount of time on each question; I would advise taking maybe a minute and a half on the easier Quant questions, leaving you with a little more time for the tougher ones. Try to utilise your time well, so that you don't end up finishing as early as I did and then kicking yourself for not taking the time to be 99% sure that you didn't make any careless mistakes.
If anyone has any questions, I'd be glad to share more about my experiences
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26 Jan 2012, 21:25
